Saturday, February 12th, 2011
Firefox 4 has just gone into beta 11, hopefully the last beta to be released before a release candidate. This release, like the 4 before it is for bugs, as Firefox 4 has been feature complete since beta 6.
A recent draft of the continued development of Firefox has shown plans (still in the planning stages) for Firefox to release another 3 versions in 2011, taking it to version 7 before the end of the year.
These developments follow criticism that Mozilla was too slow in releasing new features through 2010, with version 3 only upgrading to 3.5 despite a wealth of new features that many argued would easily constitute a big enough improvement to merit version 4 status.
Firefox beta 11 sports a new minimalist-inspired launch page
Each new browser release will contain major improvements, but focus on them in a more linear progression, so that one milestone can be achieved at a time, so that releases aren’t held back by trying to hit too many targets at once.
Google Chrome already follows a similar pattern, being on version 9 at time of writing, despite being younger than its Mozilla counterpart.
You can download the latest Firefox beta at: http://www.mozilla.com/en-GB/firefox/beta/
Tuesday, February 1st, 2011
Firefox 4 is usable right now. At time of writing it’s in beta 10, a big improvement over beta 9. If you’re the brave sort, why not download and have a go?
You can download from: http://www.mozilla.com/en-GB/firefox/beta/
You’ll find many of your favourite plugins are not compatible with Firefox 4, however the majority update quickly and many have betas of their own which are.
One warning though, if you wish to use the browser for secure uses, be aware that the bugs that still need ironing out include security bugs.
Sunday, August 8th, 2010
Firebug
If you’re not using Firefox for web design, you really – really – should be. Besides being standards-compliant and supporting thousands of useful plugins, it also supports Firebug. Firebug lets you dig into your coed in real time and try out edits and changes as well as giving you a whole range of debugging tools. What’s more, Firebug also supports Yslow a Firebug plugin from Yahoo! thyat’s pure gold. It gives you accurate readouts of your page download time and has built in tools for getting more code and minifying images by using All Smush It to reduce image size without degrading quality.
Filezilla
FileZilla is an open-source FTP client which supports sFTP. FileZilla is stable, easy to use and fast. Don’t pay for an FTP client when FileZilla is available.
Download FileZilla
Snippets
Every time you write a clever line of code, discover a unique new tool or find an elegant way to write something you should save it. In the future this will save you more and more time as you go on. You should try and keep your snippets up to date and replace them as you find better alternatives. At the very least, consult a site like CSS Tricks which has a massive, ever-growing collection of freely available web design snippets.
Frameworks
Consider looking at using a framework. In CSS BluePrint is a fairly well-known standard for preventing yourself from writing repetitive code. Perhaps you’d rather use something simper? There’s plenty out there. I use a modified version of WhiteBoard CSS for WordPress, a framework which I add to with snippets I collect.
What does the client need?
The most important thing in my experience is to balance a client’s needs with your desires and their intentions. What I mean by this is that if a client needs a website selling microwaves they need it to sell, you’ll naturally want it to look fantastic and so will they, but you will be doing a better job by making a website that works rather than one that lives up the imaginary ideals of what a ‘good website’ is in your head. A good-looking, well-coded website that sells nothing is a bad website.
Monday, January 11th, 2010
If you’re up to date enough to be running the new Firefox 3.6 release candidate, then you’ll be able to take advantage of a groovy new feature, Personas for Firefox.
Personas are basically skins, but with a better system for installing and previewing them it’s become a breeze to switch what clothes your version of Firefox is wearing.
Please note: The new release candidate may not yet be entirely stable or compatible with your plugins. if that’s the case, just wait a few weeks until Firefox 3.6 is released officially. If you’re impatient like me though (I’ve had no problems with this Firefox release), get downloading, the links are below.
Get the new Firefox release candidate here: http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/3.6/whatsnew/
Get Firefox Personas and the personas plugin for faster switching here: http://www.getpersonas.com/en-US/
